Excerpt from Old Masters and New: Essays in Art Criticism The essays which have been least altered are the earliest ones and the latest; the latter because they express my present mind as I should now express it; the former because it seemed best to leave them their somewhat youthful tone, merely endeavouring that they shall contain no opinions which I do not still hold. The earliest of all in date, that on The' Sculptors of The Early Italian Renaissance, un doubtedly owes its existence, in part, to unconscious memory of an essay of Pater's which I had read some years before. The traces of its origin could not be removed Without removing its truth, for Pater had said what I wanted to say. I can only leave it with the warning that I claim no originality for it. Indeed I care much less that any of my criticisms should be new than that they should be just, and it is likely enough that many of them will be found to coincide with those of other writers whom I may or may not have read. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.